Throughout school I was brainy kid, pudgy and never athletic. I really enjoyed swimming at the pool and hiking and camping with Boy Scouts. However I despised gym class due to coaches and other more athletic kids attitudes towards less athletic kids like me. I was often bullied by the jock kids in school and thus never wanted anything to do with athletics, sports and distanced myself from physical activites by delving into computers.
College
In the late seventies, while I was going to the University of Tennessee to study engineering, I worked at Pizza Hut. One Friday evening after an afternoon shift I made a bank deposit where I deposited the company's receipts and my paycheck so that I could pay for tuition. After I came out of the bank, I was robbed by two guys in their mid twenties. I was stabbed in seventeen different places and left for dead. I felt like a human pinata and eventually recovered from my stab wounds, but I could not focus on my studies due to how I felt inside. I failed out of the University of Tennessee's engineering program.
I still had massive bright pink scars across my stomach, sides, legs, arms and back. I felt like I could no longer go swimming without my shirt on. Boy Scouts were long over with, but I continued to hike by myself during my free time.
Eventually, I went through Tech School so that I could find a decent job that would pay for going to school. I got a job in Albuquerque, NM at Sandia National Labs and went to the University of New Mexico in nearly full time. I never had time to exercise and started to gain weight. By the time I met my wife in 1986, I weighed 205 lbs.
Work
Finally I finished college and went to work as an engineer. I never made the time to exercise and my diet was based on convenience rather than health. I continued to gain weight.
Diets
I tried a bunch of diets - Dr. Atkins, Weight Watchers, Nutrasystems, Slim-Fast, the grapefruit diet. They all left me feeling weak and depleated and afterwards even fatter. Moving to Colorado five years ago I weighed 245 lbs.
Doctors Visits
Recently, I've gained more weight. Also, my doctor in November 1999 warned me about my blood pressure and told me to start keeping a log. I weighed 258. I started to think about getting in better shape and began asking a friend at work, Dave Coleman, about the gym they had at work. I started to learn some of the basics of lifting but did not understand why both aerobics and lifting are required to maintain my weight.
Another Doctor Visit
I went to my doctor again for a regular checkup. My blood pressure was dangerously high at 190/116. I was told that I had 2 weeks to a stroke or heart attack and was put on blood pressure medication (verapamil 180mg), possibly for life.
Feeling awful on medication
The blood pressure medication left me extremely constipated and I felt really awful. All blood pressure medicine has undesirable side effects. Constipation was the "nicest" one. I really needed a plan that works. So I started to research my condition on the web. It turns out that high blood pressure can be controlled by diet and exercise.
